


One Hundred and One Smiles

by PuppyLuver256



Category: Smile For Me
Genre: Ficlet Collection, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-17 03:41:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29586711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PuppyLuver256/pseuds/PuppyLuver256
Summary: A series of prompt-based oneshots peeking into the lives of former Habititians and those in their lives. (prompts, timeframes, and applicable prompt-specific warnings will be in notes preceding chapters)
Relationships: Kamal Bora & Original Character(s), Nat Vancey & Trencil Varnnia
Comments: 6
Kudos: 7





	1. Life Lessons at the Egg Hunt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trencil takes his little one to her first Easter egg hunt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Theme:** _Spring_ / **Timeframe:** _April 1984_
> 
> Characters of focus: Trencil Varnnia, Nat Vancey  
> Relationships of focus: Trencil Varnnia & Nat Vancey

Even before he had turned, Trencil was never much of a fan of the Christian faith. The whole thing about vampires being weak to religious iconography was merely a myth, so it wasn’t like he was _personally_ harmed by any version of the church in a purely physical sense, but even so he couldn’t stand the way it always attempted to either assimilate or stamp out every other tradition it came across, as if the world wasn’t made better because of humanity’s differences. Even their holidays were basically stolen from other faiths, and if Trencil was going to participate in spring fertility festivities he would rather do so in the original intended context instead of...something something supposed prophet who may or may not have existed claiming to be a deity’s child supposedly came back to life after being executed by an ancient Roman torture device that was basic criminal handling procedure for the time. Not to mention the history of persecution of people like himself (minus the vampirism) that nearly every branch of Christianity participated in, that tends to make one bitter towards a religion no matter what.

But an Easter egg hunt was what his daughter wanted, and as the town was holding an egg hunt for children downtown, he saw no harm in letting her have a little fun. After all, the eggs had more to do with the original holiday than anything in that silly old book. Besides, there would other children there, and Trencil _did_ want Nat to be able to spend time with other children around her age even if she was still a bit too young for preschool just yet.

So here they were, early on a Sunday morning, getting ready to traipse around the park searching for brightly colored plastic egg-shaped capsules. Trencil held Nat’s hand gently as they waited for the event hosts to announce the start of the egg hunt, and she twirled her empty basket around in her other hand. “Are you excited for the egg hunt, dear?” Trencil asked with a soft smile.

“Uh-huh,” Nat said, not really paying attention. “I wanna get all the candies...”

Trencil chuckled. “Be sure to save some for everyone else.”

Soon enough, the hosts called for the kids to start searching for eggs. All at once, dozens of small children tottered around the park, looking for those colorful capsules filled with candies. Trencil was, of course, keeping a close eye on Nat, who was thankfully easy to spot in her bright pink jacket. She wandered about, trying her best to find eggs, but it seemed that the other kids were either faster or better at spotting them than she was and she couldn’t get to any before they were scooped up. With every near miss she grew increasingly frustrated, and said frustration was clearly visible on her face. Trencil had spotted one and drew her attention to it, which she grabbed excitedly. This may have been a hunt for the children to take part in, but there was no harm in giving hints so that those who weren’t having the best time could better enjoy it.

As Nat toddled about the park, her egg-finding luck was not improving. After a while, she spotted it. An unguarded basket, with many more eggs than her own. Trencil could practically see the gears turning in her little head as she stared at the basket. He was really hoping that she wasn’t going to do what he thought she was considering. She looked away from the lone basket briefly, appearing as though she wouldn’t do the predicted thing.

And not ten seconds later she turned back to it and, with speed unexpected for someone her age, approached it and reached a tiny hand inside to grab an unattended egg.

“ _Natasha!!_ ”

Nat turned her head, hand still on the pilfered egg, to see her father striding over with a look of concern on his face. “Natasha, that’s not very nice,” Trencil said, kneeling down to her level. “Whoever owns that basket worked very hard to find those eggs. Would you like it if someone else took the egg you found when you weren’t looking?”

“Uhhhh...” Nat looked at the egg, then at her almost empty basket and back at the egg again. “Mmm...no?”

“That would make you sad, wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah...”

“Now what are you going to do?” Trencil asked. Nat’s face scrunched up a bit, but she did put the pilfered egg back into the basket. “That’s better. Now let’s go try and find a few more in a fair manner. Would you like me to help you look?”

“Uh-huh...”

Trencil ushered Nat along, keeping an eye out for any eggs that Nat wouldn’t be able to find on her own. After a while, however, he felt a tugging at his pants leg that couldn’t possibly be Nat from where she was. He turned to see a little boy around Nat’s age who was holding onto a nearly full basket. “Yes?” he asked. “Do you need anything?”

“Pink girl!” the boy exclaimed. “Can I help pink girl??” The boy shook his basket full of eggs to try and emphasize the point he was making.

“I don’t see why not,” Trencil said. “Go ahead and ask her.” The boy excitedly toddled over to Nat, who stared at him with confusion before he grabbed an egg out of his basket and held it out to her. She giggled and held out her basket, and the boy placed not only that particular egg into her basket, but two more of his own eggs as well. “Now what do we say, Nat?”

“Thank you!”

It wasn’t too long before the egg hunt had come to an end. While Nat’s ability to find eggs had only marginally improved, her spirits had been lifted considerably from the help that both her father and the little boy with lots of eggs had provided. Trencil was happy to see that she had enjoyed herself, and as he led her back to the car he couldn’t help notice she kept staring at the eggs in her basket. Maybe once he’d gotten her buckled into her seat he would crack open an egg and let her have a candy in the car. She’d certainly earned it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I’ve been hammering away at this for some time, and only now am I getting around to finally making it public. Just a collection of oneshots themed around a list of prompts I made for myself, attempting to feature all the canon characters in at least two, though there are quite a few usages of OCs in focus but nothing wrong with that hehe :3c
> 
> ...I think some of my bitterness wrt Christianity bled into this and splattered all over vamp dad in the intro, huh. Ah well. I seriously doubt a vampire character would want to be associated with the church regardless of whether or not the story they were in subscribed to the “crosses and holy water and such are super effective against vampires” trend. Too many uncomfortable questions/assumptions. Though there’s an idea for original fiction writers to work with, a vampire who before being turned was a devout Christian or some other religion that is either literally damaging to them just by coming into contact with the iconography or generally speaks ill of vampires and other such “evil” creatures, and how that affects them and whether or not they continue to hold their prior faith. Food for thought.


	2. The Long-Distance Sibling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Unable to sleep so far from home, Kamal makes a long-distance call to hear a familiar voice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Theme:** _Home_ / **Timeframe:** _September 1980_
> 
> Characters of focus: Kamal Bora, Original Character  
> Relationships of focus: Kamal Bora & Original Character

Kamal laid uncomfortably in his bed, the city lights filtering into the dark of the bedroom doing little to lull him to sleep. It had been a week since he’d made the big move for school, so his mind and body had adjusted to the Pacific timezone by now, meaning that jetlag was no longer present to override his nervousness. He needed sleep, but a combination of Everything was making it near impossible. That nervous feeling over officially starting classes in a few days, the loneliness of being farther from his family than he had ever been, the anxiety that came from his new apartment not being on the ground floor and worrying how he’d handle the elevator being out of order...

He tossed and turned under his covers, desperate to try and get any sleep whatsoever. It was no use. There was no way he was going to get to sleep unaided, his body may have been tired but his brain was _wired_. He sat up in bed and tried to think of ways that could help him sleep. Chamomile tea was a thing that helped, right? Oh, but he didn’t have any, just some regular black tea bags. He could try warm milk, but he didn’t know how to prepare it properly and also couldn’t remember if he’d bought milk on his first “real” grocery trip as an adult.

“Goooddddd just let me sleeeep,” he moaned to himself. There was one more thing he could think of to at least ease his nerves, but considering the time, he didn’t know if it was a good idea. What he really wanted to do was call home. He looked over at the clock on the wall. 11:30...that would make it 2:30 over there, right? Mountain, central, eastern...yeah, New York would be experiencing time at 2:30 right now. Who wouldn’t be badly woken up at that time...?

Kamal stood up and shuffled his way to the phone. There was only one person he could think of who would both likely be up this late and not be around people who would be asleep. He’d taped a piece of paper with all the important numbers he needed to remember beside the phone on the wall, all he needed to do was find hers and hope that she would actually take his call this late at night. Dialing, calling, waiting...

“ _Okay, who the_ _ **hell**_ _do you think you are, calling this damn late?_ ” Kanti asked, sounding frustrated but thankfully not too tired. “ _Do you even have_ _ **any**_ _idea_ _what time it is?_ ”

“Yeah, it’s me, I’m sorry for waking y—”

“ _Kamal? What’s wrong?_ ” Kanti’s tone instantly softened. “ _Is something going on there or...?_ ”

“No, it’s just...” Kamal sighed. “I’m having trouble sleeping tonight,” he admitted. “Got a bad case of those nerves that I can’t get over and I, well, I guess I just needed to hear a familiar voice again.”

“ _Damn, that sucks,_ ” Kanti said. “ _Well, I was only getting ready to go to bed, not actually in bed yet, so I can stay up a bit to talk if you want._ ”

“You sure your roommates won’t mind?”

“ _They’re out at some party or something, I woulda gone but I had a huge burger for lunch and it wasn’t agreeing with me. I’ll spare you the details._ ”

“Yes, thank you.”

So they sat and talked. They talked about anything random that came across their minds for the next half-hour, and Kamal could feel some of his anxieties start to melt away. Eventually, however, Kanti did have to get to bed, though by that point Kamal felt that he could sleep easy as well. They hung up, and Kamal returned to his bed, still physically exhausted and now mentally ready to finally turn in for the night proper.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Channeling some old feelings from my own college days here. Major difference being that we had cell phones so I and my parents could call each other pretty much whenever, and also we were almost always in the same timezone so I didn’t have to worry about calling too late unless I was in fact up too late.


	3. Bolf!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Millie brings the other Habitat kids to a mini-golf course for memory making before Nat and Trevor leave for college.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Theme:** _Sports_ / **Timeframe:** _August 1999_
> 
> Characters of focus: Millie Coulro, Tim Tam, Nat Vancey, Gerry Podunk, Putunia Mollar, Trevor Garbo  
> Relationships of focus: all featured, as friends

“All right, everyone!” Millie announced to the others, her trusty golf club being held over her shoulder in a sort of power stance. “We gotta make the most outta what we have left of this summer before we lose two more good teens to the horrors of college life, so that’s why I’ve called you all here today!” She grinned proudly. “We’re gonna learn how to play us some golf, and I’m gonna teach ya!”

“Putt-putt,” Tim Tam said.

“Tim Tam’s got a point,” Nat said, motioning to the sign over the entrance to the “golf” course. “This isn’t full-sized golf, this is mini-golf. I mean, mini-golf is a fun time when you’re in the mood, but the way you were talking this up it implied we were doing the full thing.”

Millie sighed. “You really think we’re big or touristy enough to get a proper golf course?” she asked. “Besides, it’s good training for the final part of a real golf game, unless you’re a super shot and get holes-in-one all the time you’re gonna need to putt on the green sometimes.”

“I betz that real golf doesn’t have the fancy windmillz,” Gerry chuckled.

“Well, no, cuz that’d get in the way of the ball,” Millie said. “Whiiiich I guess is kinda the point of it in mini-golf, now that I think about it...”

Regardless of the banter, the six of them made their way into the mini-golf course. It took a bit to get the entry fees paid, if only because Millie couldn’t remember her actual age again and eventually just gave up and held out her license for the clerk to examine, but soon enough everyone had a putter and a ball (though Millie had insisted on bringing her regular club in for luck with the promise that she would only use the putter for her actual strokes). Everyone’s ball color was perfect for them: yellow for Millie, red for Putunia, blue for Gerry, pink for Nat, green for Tim Tam, and while Trevor had initially gone for a “green” ball, it was actually another blue one and he eventually settled on getting a white ball to make it easier for him to see against the grass. “All right, guys, time to show you the perfect putting technique,” Millie said as the group approached hole one. She put her ball on the starting square and lined up her shot just right.

_Thwack!_

The ball sailed across the green in a near-perfect straight line, perfect enough to sink straight into the hole at the end. “Hell yeah, hole in one!” Millie exclaimed. “Okay, who’s next?”

“I can go next,” Nat said, writing her name down under Millie’s in the score card they’d been given. She placed her ball on the square and tried to replicate what she’d seen Millie do, and though it was a bit misaligned and slightly underpowered it got pretty close to the hole. “Two-stroke,” she said as she gently nudged the ball the rest of the way in.

“Wait, so how are we doing multiple hits?” Putunia asked. “We gonna take turns with each hit or let everyone go through the hole in full before the next person?”

“All at once,” Tim Tam said. “Increase the chaos.”

“Y’know, so long as we don’t tear up the place, there’s nothing stopping us from just making up our own rules as a whole,” Trevor suggested. “It’s not like a prize is on the line or anything.”

“You make a compelling point, dog boy,” Millie said with a grin. “Okay then, we’re changing things up. If everyone’s down for it, we’re no longer playing mini-golf—we’re playing _bolf!_ And the rules are as follows: get your ball in the hole in the funnest way possible! Go crazy about it! We’re making up our own sports now!”

Everyone let out a hearty “ _Yeah!_ ”, and then the fun really began as trends began to form. Putunia would rocket her ball into the hole as she “flew” across the green. Gerry putted the ball around by using the handle of the club like a pool cue. Trevor pretended to summon some thunder power from Sabastian or something along those lines to give the ball more “oomph”. Tim Tam didn’t bother with the club and just kicked the ball across the green. Millie and Nat were the only ones who seemed to be playing according to the traditional rules, but they were enjoying themselves and that was what mattered.

Soon enough, they had gotten to the 18th hole and were in very good spirits. The whole outing had been a blast overall, and plans to get food afterward only boosted the mood. “We gotta get Cosmos in on this next time they’re back,” Trevor said as he made what he’d been calling a “thunder shot”. “Hopefully there’s no bad allergy stuff so they can fully enjoy it, too.”

“Teddy too?” Nat suggested. “Only seems fair.”

“...Yeah, Teddy too.”

“Maybe Cosmos ‘n Ted can use their fancy college educationz to answer a big ol’ question here,” Gerry said. He pointed up to the large kitschy dinosaur statue and an...oddly placed hole carved into its molding. “Why’z that dinosaur gotz a bung-hole?”

“ _Wow_ , that’s an unfortunate design,” Millie said with a grimace.

“Gross.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was basically my StephenVlog minigolf reference story, hehe. Bolf from the early days, at a Starman meetup I think, and the “bunghole” dinosaur from 2016.


End file.
